how to stabilize underground bunker

I appreciate the prayers...not the unending bible quoting in this thread. I would prefer to go to a specific thread you started with *your* attempts
to save me....

Des

You must save yourself all 1 can do is LIGHT the path ITS YOUR WILLS NOT MINE. I will do the thread a favor and let it ride I just feel I must alert
you of the potential fails in diggin in and not being fully SPIRITUALLY prepared for the next phase.

Originally posted by demontigny
Okay first.. There are no earthquakes where i live.. And im not near any fault lines highly doubt ill ever see one.. Second i did my research on the
best known kinds of shelters.

The following is my opinion as a member participating in this discussion.

You better plan on earthquakes for pretty much any catastrophe that is going to require a serious
underground shelter. At the very least your going to get shock waves that will pretty much do the same thing as an earthquake, and depending on the
soil composition they can travel long distances and become amplified just like a tsunami.

The best shelters are made from formed concrete and rebar, because they will not rust out over time and are stronger then something like cinder block.
If you look at most WWII military bunkers and pillboxes, thats how they were built. Water penetration and humidity are the biggest problems people
tend to have with building shelters. Cement at least eliminates the problem of rust, but not of leaking or condensation. A dome is structurally
probably the strongest shape.

If I ever had the money to build a shelter I would go with a Monolithic Dome: Monolithic Domes

I also came across this, but I'd have to research into them more: Concrete Canvas

I would also prefer to build it into a hill, or have enough dirt shipped in that I could bury it above ground level. The minute you start going below
ground, your problems and costs start to exponentially increase as do your problems with water intrusion, shockwaves, etc...

As to your question about support, whats the point if your not expecting any earthquakes or shock waves? Just build a normal foundation/footer with
rebar, and packed on the correct combination of soil, I would assume. If you're planning on building a shock absorber type of arrangement like the US
government, then you obviously have enough money to hire a contractor to have a shelter professionally built. Personally, I wouldn't even worry about
trying to provide a shock absorber under my slab, as to me, it would be a potential place for that slab to crack.

Besides...
If you're getting hit with something that is so severe that its going to damage the foundation, you have bigger problems to worry about like the roof
and walls caving in, or you getting forcefully thrown/bounced around inside until you're nothing but a bloody pulp.

As an ATS Staff Member, I will not moderate in threads such as this where I have participated as a member.

if i was going to build an underground bunker , i would dig out the side of a hill or mound and install 2 or 3 shipping containers and cover them with
the earth that i had excavated.
the front of the containers would then be covered up with a grass turf wall , in no time at all everything would blend in with the surroundings.
also there would be several escape tunnels built into the system .

Out at sea, as long as you stay off the continental shelves, you're in pretty good shape from most stuff outside something atmospheric like fallout,
extreme weather, or something coming from space. Of course everything depends on what the disaster is.

I have to ask a few questions before I can even attempt to answer this question. There are to many variables for anyone to give you an answer, which
won't kill you, based on the info.
What is the soil composed of?
Do you have bed rock and at what depth
What is the depth of your water table?
If you have bed rock what is its composition? Limestone, Granite, Slate?
You say you have trees? Hardwoods or Pine?
Are you tunneling in or excavation from the surface?

we are using a six foot diameter metal culvert for our shelter, so we can stand up, no crouching. there is six foot of earth over the top of it, or
rather it is six feet under ground level. we have an air ex-changer that is filtered, not to be used till the dust settles. it is well stocked with
everything we need. and when we need to come out, we will be well armed as well. Our site is hidden from view, and is actually in a remote place away
from everyone so no one knows where it is except us (as far as we know). There are a lot of thing to think about if you are going under ground though,
especially supporting the load that is overhead, and if your shelter is conventional, just make sure you use a lot of large uprights (4x8's) and
large cross beams to support your roof. you don't want your shelter to be your tomb.

In the apocalyptic film 'A Boy and His Dog', which is a fictional account of life after a WW3 scenario, organized groups roam the destroyed terrain
searching for underground bunkers where they know will be treasure troves of canned food and...women. Teams of these nomads work like crazy to dig
down into these bunkers once they find them.

u/g bunkers would have to leave no tell-tale signs of their existence and in my mind the biggest tell-tale would be the air intake and venting. Hiding
these pipes would require some serious ingenuity. One solution would be to conceal the exhaust/intake vents inside an outcrop of boulders so that the
cracks between the boulders allow air to pass in and out. The boulder outcrop could be created artificially but the rocks should be large and very
heavy.

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